Page:The Presidents of the United States, 1789-1914, v. I.djvu/29

Rh one time from the violence of the savages, at another from assassination by a treacherous guide, at a third from being drowned in crossing the Alleghany river on a raft, have been described in all the accounts of his early manhood, substantially from his own journal, published in London at the time. He reached Williamsburg on his return on January 16, 1754, and delivered to Gov. Dinwiddie the reply of the French commander to his message of inquiry. No more signal test could have been afforded of Washington s various talents and characteristics, which this expedition served at once to display and to develop. "From that moment," says his biographer, Irving, "he was the rising hope of Virginia."

He was then but just finishing his twenty-first year, and immediately after his return he was appointed to the chief command of a little body of troops raised for meeting immediate exigencies; but the military establishment was increased as soon as the governor could convene the legislature of Virginia, and Washington was appointed lieutenant-colonel of a regiment, with Joshua Fry, an accomplished Oxford scholar, as his colonel. Upon Washington at once devolved the duty of going forward with such companies as were enlisted, and the sudden death of Col. Fry soon left him in full command of the expedition. The much-misrepresented skirmish with the French troops, resulting